


No Words

by 401



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Bucky Barnes Recovering, Camping, Canada, Comfort, Fluff, Love, M/M, Making Out, Mild Angst, Steve Rogers Feels, Vacation, canadian rockies
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-18
Updated: 2016-03-18
Packaged: 2018-05-27 10:57:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,884
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6281833
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/401/pseuds/401
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bucky and Steve go on a camping holiday together.</p>
            </blockquote>





	No Words

**Author's Note:**

  * For [CrushedCosmicCube (MistressOfMalplaquet)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MistressOfMalplaquet/gifts).



“It’s beautiful,” Bucky whispered.

 

Steve nodded, looking out over the dwarfing expanse of mountainous forest. There was a valley below them, scarred deeply by rapids, just visible as a crystalline blue gash against the dark pines. The air smelt of damp soil and needles crushed underfoot and was so cold that it hit Steve in the back of the throat like peppermint gum. There was some snow capping the Rockies in the distance, but none where they were, just a comfortable chill in the air. Canada had been a good idea.

“We need to pitch a tent,” Bucky turned suddenly from the view, instantly grasped by a sense of purpose in his movements and a subtle expression on his face that Steve recognised and did not welcome; mission mode.

Steve caught Bucky, stroking his shoulders and getting into his line of vision a distraction.

“Buck, Buck, Buck,” Steve grinned, “Relax! We don’t need to rush into all the hard stuff just yet. This isn’t a task or a mission or a deployment. This is a _vacation.”_

Bucky nodded and took a deep breath, feeling some of the nervous energy leave his muscles. Steve was right. He struggled to let that iron guard of his down for a minute, let alone a whole weekend. The thought of being inefficient or idle for a moment terrified him. No because of the immediate consequences, but the risk of punishment that he appreciated was gone with Hydra, but stuck around in his subconscious mind like a tumour.

“I’m sorry,” Bucky sighed. He leaned his head forward, letting it rest on Steve’s shoulder.

The smell of the forest mixed with the familiar scent of home and warmth as Steve wrapped his arms around him and pulled him closer. The coolness of the wind around him and the sound of robins where the only things reminding him that he was in the middle of nowhere and no in their apartment in Brooklyn. DC had gotten too much for both of them and held too many sour memories so they had moved back to their roots in the fall. They pair had not looked back.

“I don’t want to ruin this for you,” Bucky groaned, letting his weight fall against Steve’s chest and surrendering to the gentle rocking motion that Steve had adopted, swaying from foot to foot.

Steve blew out a sigh and smiled into Bucky’s hair.

“Aw come on, you know it ain’t like that,” Steve reassured before pulling out of the hg and looking around at the clearing they were set in.

“If we go up this trail we can be back before dark; you reckon you could find this spot again?” Steve scanned, checking his watch and then looking up at the sky, already slashed with hot streaks of orange and pink.

Bucky nodded. If there was one thing he was good at, it was navigation. It was not Steve’s strong point, and after a few runs of experience the Captain had learned to give in and let Bucky do what he was best at.

And so they set off. The trail was a thin one, a barely bald streak of trodden ground that weaved in and out of the forest like a dropped thread. It was all uphill besides a few troughs that Steve made a challenge to jump over every time they were passed.

“You know,” Steve started about half way through the trail, “I reckon we…Buck?”  


Steve stopped dead and spun around, checking all of his points and staring into the vast expanses of dark forest on all sides of him. They were no longer scenic or beautiful, they were a claustrophobic curtain around him, hazing his vision. He could not see Bucky.

“Bucky, tell me where you are. Real sharpish, baby,” Steve whispered, feeling his pulse pick up.

“Eyes up, Captain.”

Steve snapped his head up, looking towards the ceiling of leaves to see Bucky perched impossibly high in one of the trees next to him.

“Pretty quiet, huh?” Bucky grinned, this pride at his own craftiness only faltering when he saw the flush on Steve’s face.

“I scared you?” He asked, jumping down and falling into a crouch next to Steve.

Steve nodded, chuckling breathlessly before pressing his lips against Bucky’s roughly.

“Don’t do that to me,” He mumbled into the kiss, “I’m 97 years old, remember?”

Bucky hummed in agreement, closing his eyes and surrendering willingly to the kiss. Steve sensed the willingness and deepened the contact, replacing soft movements with rougher ones and pushing Bucky gently so that his back was against the trunk of a tree.

“You kiss real good for an old man,” Bucky gasped, pulling a face of mock surprise that made Steve chuckle.

Bucky had one of those faces. It stayed deadpan say, 75% of the time, but when he chose to show real expression it was cuttingly accurate. Natasha had joked that Bucky’s ‘stink look’ (as Sam called it) was more dangerous than the metal arm. They had all agreed.

“You’re older than me, Buck,” Steve laughed, moving his lips to Bucky’s neck but pausing in his tracks when he felt tension ripple through Bucky like a charge of electricity.

Bucky stood there, looking at Steve dead in the eyes, a mix of fear and searching confusion painted on his face.

“Steve?” Bucky said quietly, his voice shaking around the single word in a way that made Steve’s palms sweat.

 _Calm down, Bucky,_ Steve urged silently, holding the Sergeant’s hands.

“Steve, how old am I?” Bucky asked even more quietly with what sounded like impending tears clinging to the back of his throat.

Steve took a slow breath. He would be no help at all if he sounded like a nervous wreck. He stroked a lock of Bucky’s hair back behind his ear and kissed his forehead affectionately.

“99, baby. Biologically about 29 or 30,” Steve said, trying his hardest to sound ‘matter of fact’ when speaking about 70 lost years and miles of confusion and discarded memories.

Bucky nodded, swallowing hard and looking around himself. There was a stillness on the trail. Light from behind the wall of trees, magnified by its reflection off of the lakes below, dappled through the leaves and across Bucky’s face, leaving him half painted in thick, golden spots of light and illuminating one of his eyes so it glowed bright blue rather than dark grey. The deep red of his shirt was transformed to fiery orange and his hair glowed like molten copper.

“And you still look beautiful,” Steve smiled, cupping Bucky’s cheek in his hand.

Bucky smiled weakly and took a shaky breath of cold air.

“Is it okay if we go back?” Bucky asked, ducking his eyes from Steve’s, “We can go further in the morning, I promise.”  


Steve nodded, taking Bucky’s hand in his and going back the way they came, half led by Bucky and his unerring sense of direction. Steve sat and watched in admiration as the Sergeant put together a tent in less than ten minutes and set up a fire, all with such well learnt efficiency that it seemed like he was doing it without realising. When Bucky was done, he jogged off into the forest for a few moments and returned with two large logs, one on each shoulder.

He placed them down near the fire, tapping the place next to him for Steve to sit down. The yellow two-man tent also glowed in the light of the dwindling sunset. The scene was exactly what Steve had meant when he had said he had needed a break from the city. He was happy, he just wished it was that easy for Bucky.

Steve pulled on a woollen jumper to fight the growing chill and sat down next to Bucky.

“We went camping once, didn’t we?” Bucky asked, the crackling of the fire almost drowning out his naturally very quiet voice.

Steve had always loved the soft-spokeness.

“Yeah, that was a great weekend,” Steve recalled, “We were, what, 19? You jumped into a lake before checking the temperature and for once it was me trying to stop _you_ dying of pneumonia.”

Bucky chuckled, a genuine smile painting his face a happier shade, crinkling his eyes.

“You kissed me that night,” Steve smiled, “I socked you in the nose and then kissed you back.”

Bucky laughed out loud. Out loud. Steve went silent before he realised that it was the first time he had heard that in seventy-something years.

“Kiss me again,” Steve offered huskily, putting his fingertips against Bucky’s chin to guide his mouth.

Bucky looked up a Steve, watching as the Captain’s eyes turned from aquamarine a deep, stony blue that only ever meant anger or sex. The former was nowhere to be seen in Steve’s movements so Bucky relaxed and gave into the running script of Steve’s mouth around his, feeling his cheeks heat up instantly burning against the cool air.

“I love you, Bucky,” Steve half moaned into the kiss, frustration putting a husk in his words that coiled in Bucky’s stomach like a rope.

Steve _was_ frustrated. He was frustrated by his seeming inability to show Bucky just how much he loved him. He was frustrated that he could not touch all of him at once and kiss everywhere at the same time. He was frustrated by his own lack of charisma in the situation, by the fact that even though he had known Bucky for nine decades, the man still made him nervous, like a kid with a crush, and this nervousness shackled his hands and pinned his tongue.

“Let’s go into the tent, it’s cold now,” Bucky suggested, pulling Steve by the waistband of his jeans in clumsy steps to the yellow tent, past the waning fire flicking its long grey tail of smoke in the half-light of the evening.

Steve backed into the tent, shuffling backwards and pulling Bucky in after him. Bucky straddled Steve’s hips and pulled his t-shirt over his head, tensing a little as the cold air hit his skin. Steve sat up, running his hands up Bucky’s sides and pressing their chests together. The heat of Steve’s skin against his went right through Bucky. He ran his fingers through Steve’s hair and grabbed a loose fist of his before tilting Steve’s head backwards and taking his lips to his neck so that his nose grazed along the line of his jaw.

“ _Jesus,”_ Steve hissed, pulling Bucky’s hips down and forward, pressing into the pressure and gripping his thighs.

Bucky coughed a warm laugh against Steve’s throat and nudged the Captain back, so that he was lying flat on the foam camping mattress. Bucky followed and kissed Steve again, this time a long lingering kiss that made Steve’s breath catch in his throat and his cheeks blaze up with uncontrolled colours. Bucky cupped Steve’s face in his hands, watching as the skin under the metal one dappled under the cold of the titanium.

“I love you, old man,” Bucky grinned.

Steve just nodded back, a smile growing on his face, unable to form the words he needed out of the jumbled mix of perfect sensations running circuits in his head. He didn’t care.

There weren’t words for this feeling anyway.

 

 


End file.
